Astronomy Day? Really? What a Boring Name... We Need a New One!

October 8. The day which is marked on the calendars belonging to all fellow astronomers. The day when the world suddenly remembers that we exist. However, the name of this day is extremely boring and turns away those who is not familiar with star gazing. Sounds just like any other “special day”. What if we used more names that would force everyone to be interested and curious? Let’s call our conventions flashier than ever, let’s follow trends, and bring more visitors to astronomy related events.

^{Image Credit: Sternberg State Astronomical Institute}

I do not want to be a lazy coach critic that just yells about changes! I propose brand new names for events that we astronomers cherish and love! Brace yourself, here I come!

The Day When Earth Was Left Alone. We will celebrate manned space exploration and maybe even launch some of our congressmen to the Moon. This would be an event of the century!

The Day When Earth Was Found. Let’s be appreciative of Fermi’s paradox and contemplate about the fact that we had not found or were found by aliens. Due to the fact that we are seemingly alone, we should celebrate this day constantly and hope that our noise will attract attention from the stars. 

The Doomsday (Not A Comic Character). Yet another year without an apocalypse. Those prophets need to step up their game and we need to celebrate that we have more time left to reconsider our values. We should also hold a competition for the best apocalypse prediction of the year.

Stupidly Ancient Universe Day. Let’s all gather together and cheer for our home universe that is quite an old lady. She is 13.8 billion years old and needs some attention from her grandchildren. We should make our lady a bit more comfortable about her age by celebrating her birthday only on February 29.

Many Me Day. Some quantum mechanics are terribly amazing. Just think about a single photon that can exist in two places simultaneously. This is a paradigm of world’s wondrous nature. Let’s celebrate it by gathering together and multitasking crazily. Remember that when you do two things simultaneously you challenge photons at their game. It is unlikely to win in this game, but it is really cool that we can break the rules and do multiple tasks concurrently.

The Day of 10 Planets. Our old friend Pluto is no longer a planet and we lost a very important part of the crew while defining new rules. I still cannot comprehend how those “barbarian astronomers” (I love them though) dared to strip Pluto of its planethood! However, we can still try to bring this status back to Pluto. One hundred “Days of 10 Planets” should do the trick.

The Day of Proving Unprovable. Let’s just appreciate the Null Hypothesis that allows us to prove things by disproving their null. Or vice versa? This concept can be understood only by those who spent last two years studying statistics and covering chalkboards with endless formulas. However, it does not mean that we should not appreciate their effort! Let us celebrate their research at least once a year… Maybe, also on February 29.

These are some catchy names that could attract millions of visitors. Naming is whole industry. I think I could make a name for myself (no pun intended) in the naming industry! What do you think?